AI-based new catheter to help prevent bacterial infections

US researchers have designed a new type of catheter tube optimised by novel artificial intelligence AI technology that impedes the upstream mobility of bacteria without the need for antibiotics or other chemical antimicrobial methodsWith the new design the number of bacteria that are able to swim upstream in laboratory experiments was reduced 100foldBacteria are remarkably good swimmers a trait that can be detrimental to human healthOne of the most common bacterial infections in a health care setting comes from bacteria entering the body through catheters thin tubes inserted in the urinary tractThough catheters are designed to draw fluids out of a patient bacteria are able to propel themselves upstream and into the body via catheter tubes using a unique swimming motion causing 300 million of catheterassociated urinary infections in the US alone annuallyIn the study researchers at the California Institute of Technology Caltech designed tubes with triangular protrusions like shark fins along the inside of the tubes wallsThe results published in the journal Science Advances showed that these geometric structures effectively redirected bacterial movement propelling them toward the centre of the tube where the faster flow pushed them back downstream The triangles finlike curvature also generated vortices that further disrupted bacterial progressUsing 3D printed catheter tubes and highspeed cameras the team monitored bacterial progress The tubes with triangular inclusions resulted in a reduction of upstream bacterial movement by two orders of magnitude a 100fold decreaseThe team then continued simulations to determine the most effective triangular obstacle shape to impede bacterias upstream swimmingThey then fabricated microfluidic channels analogous to common catheter tubes with the optimised triangular designs to observe the movement of E coli bacteria under various flow conditionsThe observed trajectories of the E coli within these microfluidic environments aligned almost perfectly with the simulated predictionsFurther with cuttingedge AI methods called neural operators the team was able to accelerate the catheter design optimisation computations so they required not days but minutesThe resulting model proposed tweaks to the geometric design further optimising the triangle shapes to prevent even more bacteria from swimming upstream The final design enhanced the efficacy of the initial triangular shapes by an additional 5 per cent in simulationsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever